


Tales of a Cup

by haveyouseenmymind



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Ghost Stories, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Reader-Insert, Scotty loves trolling people, chapter two is a bit creepy, see warnings in the notes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-13
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-10-09 03:23:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,697
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17399108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haveyouseenmymind/pseuds/haveyouseenmymind
Summary: People are curious about Scotty’s tea cup. And so he tells them various stories how he got it.





	1. Jim Kirk

**Author's Note:**

> Jim Kirk is the first one to ask, though he wished that he didn't.

It seemed like people had an absurd fascination with that little porcelain tea cup Scotty always drunk his tea from. You had no idea why, cause there were way more interesting things. Seriously, you were on a ship in the middle of space, new worlds and all the mysteries that came with them, and yet people were obsessed over a tea cup.

But it also seemed as if Scotty had way too much fun with their curiousness. It all started with the captain.

+++

Kirk was down in engineering, talking with Scotty about who knows what upgrades, when you came down from the mess hall with two sandwiches and a can of freshly brewed tea, to remind your boyfriend that even chief engineers need to eat.

The two didn’t notice you when you stepped into Scotty’s office, since they were too caught up in their discussion. You smiled softly, the image in front of you was too adorable. Kirk was sitting at the desk as he frowned with interest at the PADD in his hands, while Scotty stood beside him, one hand on his captain’s shoulder, the other gesturing at the PADD as he rambled on enthusiastically.

You coughed slightly to gain their attention, and had to stifle a laugh when both men snapped up their heads immediately. As soon as Scotty realized it was you who was disturbing them, he grinned at you broadly.

“Y/N! What brings you down here?”

But before you could answer him, his eyes fell on the tray in your hands.

“Oh, seems like I forgot lunch again, eh?”

You just smiled at him and put the tray on the desk, which apparently was the sign for the the captain to leave, so he stood up and cleared his throat.

“I think that’s my cue to leave. Scotty, those updates look good. Tell me later when you can start installing them. Lieutenant Y/L/N, it was nice to see you.”

You nodded back at him, feeling bad for having interrupted their conversation.

“You sure you want to leave, captain? There’s enough tea for all of us.”

Scotty, who meanwhile had sat down and pulled his usual tea cup somewhere out of his desk, agreed with you.

“Yeah, why don’t you stay for a cup? Y/N makes the best tea on the ship. I’m sure there’s another cup somewhere… around here?”

He pointed at the mess on his desk, then looked around to see if he could make a find anywhere else in his chaotic office.

You nearly choked on a laugh, cause your boyfriend had never been really good at keeping things in order. He had once tried to explain his system of chaos to you, but you after a few minutes you were completely lost while he was still going on with his train of thoughts.

Apparently, the captain had similar feelings. When you looked at him, there was an amused smile on his face that clearly spoke of the fondness for his friend.

“No it’s ok Scotty, don’t bother with it. I’m supposed to meet Bones now, anyway.”

But before he slipped out of the door his gaze wandered to the cup in Scotty’s hand.

“Though there’s one thing I’d always liked to know. What’s the story behind that tea cup? It seems to be a bit out of place here, so there must be one.”

A slightly evil grin was spreading on Scotty’s face and his eyes started twinkling with mischief. The poor captain, you knew he had doomed his own fate with that question.

“Oh, didn’t I tell you? I found it on Delta Vega, when I was removed to there. Bloody little thing was always there on that one table, looking pristine and clean, never gathering the smallest crumb of dust. And I swear, at night, there was always that smell of good old darjeeling in the air. So I asked Keenser about it, took me awhile to gather the whole story, you know how he is, and it turned out it wasn’t his. He never even had touched that darn cup.”

The captain looked curiously at his chief engineer, and it seemed he wasn’t convinced of that story yet.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Well, it turned out, that there was someone posted to that god forlorn planet before even Keenser had set foot on it. I found his log in the computer, and it ended at one night, right before he had to get out into the cold the next day to do some repairs outside of the station. That’s the last thing anybody had ever heard of him, he was probably eaten by one of those nasty giant creatures running around there. Must have been his tea cup. Thought I’d take it with me, so that the poor bastard’s soul wouldn’t have to stay on that bloody deserted place.”

Kirk’s face turned from curiosity to sheer disbelief.

“So you’re telling me that there’s a haunted tea cup on my ship? You’re pulling my leg, Scotty.”

But since your boyfriend was a master of telling tales, he kept a straight face and looked at the captain with the most serious expression.

“Oh I wish I did Jim. Wish I did.”

Before he could say anything else, Kirk’s comm started chirping. He looked at it, and then turned his head back at Scotty.

“That’s Bones, I have to go now. But I’ll come back, cause you can’t leave me at that. There’s no damn ghost on my ship.”

Scotty sighed ruefully.

“If you say so, Jim.”

“Damn you, Scotty. Sometimes I really hate you.”

And with those words the captain vanished out of the room. Still satisfied with himself, Scotty gave his attention back to you, as he first poured the tea in a plain white mug from the mess hall you had brought along, and then into his own cup, grinning like the cat that got the cream.

“So love, how was your day so far?”

You smiled back at him, glad that he had forgotten lunch, otherwise you would have missed out on what just had happened.

“Very good, and it has just gotten better.”

He smiled at you and simply sipped on his tea.


	2. Christine Chapel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The second person to ask is Christine Chapel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: includes a creepy doll and mentions spiders and insects

Another curious soul was Christine Chapel, the head nurse of the Enterprise and the one woman who was, not so secretly, running medbay. Had she known how the Scot would react to that simple question, she surely wouldn’t have asked though.

+++

It was early in the morning, well, at least as far as one could say in space. Your shift would start in half an hour, and you were enjoying breakfast at the mess hall, a steaming cup of tea in front of you, while you were chatting with Christine, who was telling you about the newest gossip.

You were relieved when your boyfriend, whom you hadn’t seen since dinner the evening before, entered the mess hall. He had spent last night in engineering, taking care of some emergency repairs, and so it was no wonder how exhausted he looked. You were glad that you had made a whole can of tea, since it surely would help to make him feel better after that long night.

When he spotted you, he walked right over to the two of you, offered Christine a tired smile before he leaned down to give you a short kiss. He sat down next to you, and put his own tea cup, that he indeed had brought with him in expectation to enjoy some of your tea, on the table, before he reached for the can next to you, and poured himself a cup.

With a relieved sigh he took his first sip, and you could watch how he gradually became more relaxed, enjoying the hot beverage and his break from work. Christine eyed him with a hint of professional concern, before her gaze wandered to the cup in his hand.

“That’s a really cute teacup, Mr. Scott.”

Your boyfriend’s answer was a simple smile, but there was also that mischievous gleam returning to his eyes. Knowing what that meant and how it would completely turn over the conversation, you tried to hide a laugh that you couldn’t hold back behind a cough, as to not ruin whatever hilarious story would follow now.

Scotty put his cup down, and suddenly he was beaming the most innocent smile at Christine before he started with his little act. **  
**

“Oh thanks, Chapel. It certainly is, even though it came into my possession in a quite mysterious way.”

He waited a minute, to see if the nurse had taken the bait, and indeed, she seemed to be curious, though you could see that she also was kinda wary about the whole thing.

“Well, how did you get this teacup?”

Not laughing was really hard at this point, but you tried your best to hold yourself back to see what your boyfriend would come up with. To be honest, you had your doubts that he would be able to fool Christine as easily as he had done with the captain before, but that made everything even more hilarious, though it would surely disappoint your boyfriend. **  
**

“Well Christine, you see, there was that one time I was on shore leave,  just before that whole unfortunate debacle with Archer’s dog. I was in the mood for a bit of hiking, and so I thought I’d try my luck and go for a nice stroll through the woods.”

The blonde woman looked at the engineer skeptically, and you could see that she wasn’t that impressed with the story so far. But before she could interrupt, Scotty kept spinning his fantastic tale.

“It was a really nice day, but after a while I got, as I have to admit to my own shame, a bit lost. And so I was stumbling through the forest, wondering where I was and where to go, when I found this wide open clearing, that seemed to just have appeared out of thin air.” **  
**

He made a distinct break to take another sip of his tea, but he was in no hurry to get back to the story, enjoying Christine’s obvious impatience for him to start talking again.

“So what happened next?”

Scotty, who was clearly satisfied at the nurse’s interest in his story, set his cup, to Christine’s annoyance, back down on the table very slowly, and let out a soft sigh before he returned to telling his story.

 

“Well, I know this sounds unbelievable, but right there, in the middle of nowhere was this small wooden table, with three just as small chairs around it. Two were standing, while one was laying on the ground backwards, as if someone had just stood up and left the place very hastily. Right across of it, on the other side of the table, sat a doll with long blonde hair and a very dirty black dress.”

You shivered at the image, impressed with the setting Scotty had come up this fast. He could have fooled you, but thankfully you knew your boyfriend good enough to know when he was pulling someone’s leg. However, the story so far turned out to be quite creepy, and he wasn’t done with it yet.

“Curious as I am, I stepped closer to the whole scene, and saw that it had closed its eyes, which kinda threw me off, though I didn’t know why at that moment. Oh, and not to forget the tiny little spiders crawling all over it and through it’s hair. That really was a nasty sight. But still, I tried to examine the setup a bit closer, and realized that it looked like everything had been there for years, as the most of the table’s wood was rotten and some insects had made their home in it. The next thing I noticed, was the set of porcelain tea cups on the table, though the cup of the one across the doll was missing, and just the saucer was left.”

Scotty stopped talking for a moment, and you were anxious to hear what would happen next. One glance at Christine didn’t tell you anything about what she was thinking, as her face gave nothing of her thoughts or emotions away. But Scotty still wasn’t done, and maybe he could catch her with the rest of his tale.

“So I looked closer at the doll’s cup, and what can I tell you, it was filled with a completely black liquid. That’s at least what I thought, cause when I tried emptying the cup, it flowed out of it very slowly, like some kind of slabby goo.”

Finally, Christine said something, sheer disbelief in her voice as she interrupted the engineer.

“Why the hell would you empty that tea cup? Or even touch it at all?”

Scotty just shrugged, but you could see a small smile on his face. He was clearly happy that he finally had gotten Christine fully interested in his story.

“You said so yourself, it is a really nice teacup, and leaving it there would have been such a waste. However, after a while I realized that it was slowly growing dark, so it would have been best to leave and try finding my way back out. I stepped back, packed cup and saucer into my jacket’s pocket, and got ready to leave. But not before turning around one last time to look at the doll, and let’s be honest, I got the shock of my life. I swear honest to goodness, when I looked at that doll, it’s eyes were wide open, staring at me accusingly. After that, I left as fast as I could and never went back there. But the cup is still in my possession, as you can see.”

After he had finished talking, Scotty stared expectantly at Christine Chapel, hoping that he would get a similar reaction like he got from the captain the time he had told him another tale. But the woman just looked at him, blinked once, twice, before she raised an eyebrow.

“Mr. Scott, that was just… ridiculous. I think you better take today off, it seems to me like you’ve overworked last night. Now excuse me, I need to head to medbay and prepare for my shift. Y/N, we’ll see each other later.”

And with that Christine stood up and left, greeting the captain and doctor McCoy as they entered the hall.

Your own gaze swept over to your boyfriend, who was completely surprised, as if he had not quite understood what just had happened. He then looked at you with a pout on his face, clearly unhappy about the situation.

“What just happened? Was the story not good enough?”

You sighed with sympathy and gave him a soft kiss on the cheek, trying to console the poor man.

“No, I think it was brilliant, and I really loved it. But I don’t think Christine’s the right victim for your stories, you know how she is. Nobody who can intimidate doctor McCoy would get scared by a ghost story, no matter how good it is.”

“You’re probably right, Y/N. Nothing can frighten nurse Chapel. But honestly, I think that woman spends too much time with Leonard. Did you see her eyebrow going up like that? Seriously, that was kinda creepy.”

You laughed at that, and noticed the captain and the CMO coming closer to your table, clearly wanting to join you with their own breakfast. But right in the middle of walking, Kirk stopped suddenly, his eyes growing wide when they fell on the porcelain teacup in front of Scotty. He looked up at the engineer, who smiled at him innocently and waved at his friend.

This made the blond turn to the right abruptly, heading for another table with a hurried stride. His best friend, who had nearly run into him, stared at you in confusion, before he grumbled and followed Kirk.

The captain’s obvious unease with that innocent little teacup made you laugh, and it seemed like it had cheered up Scotty, who just smiled smugly and took another sip of his tea.


End file.
